Month: June, 2010

by Scott Smith

ON WRITING SOLO COMPARED TO WORKING WITH A PARTNER

“Well, it’s much lonelier. And when I worked with Charles, we talked and talked and talked for months, just talking. I sort of don’t know another way to do it; so I ended up just writing, and writing all the conversation, because I needed to say those things and I didn’t want to actually, obviously, talk out loud. I would write my side of our conversations–what would have been a conversation with a collaborator. And by doing that, it was really very helpful, because I ended up with an eighty-eight-page outline that turned into a script. So, it’s interesting writing alone, because you can never get off the hook. You can never toss the ball to somebody else, or you can never say that is a bad idea, hoping they’ll make it into a good idea. It’s like playing tennis with a wall. It just keeps coming back to you, so you’re pushing yourself all the time. There’s never anybody else to ease the load, and I found it exhausting actually. But you also get to have your own ideas remain in a purer way.

by Scott Smith

by Scott Smith

Charles Leadbeater went looking for radical new forms of education — and found them in the slums of Rio and Kibera, where some of the world’s poorest kids are finding transformative new ways to learn. And this informal, disruptive new kind of school, he says, is what all schools need to become.

by Scott Smith

Ira Glass: But there’s a really fascinating instance of what you’re talking about in Chuck Klosterman’s new book [Eating the Dinosaur]. I feel like this is a really weird example to bring up, but he interviews me and Errol Morris about interviewing. It’s a really funny chapter because I give all of these totally Pollyanna answers—I mean, things I really believe, but I’m like [here he goes into an earnest falsetto, like a very sincere Chipmunk] “I just think that people open up because they sense that somebody’s really interested. It’s just a natural human thing.” And Errol is like “I DOUBT WHETHER WE KNOW OURSELVES, AND THE ACT OF BEING INTERVIEWED IS AN ACT OF ASSERTING A SELF WHICH WE HOPE IS TRUE.” Seriously, every answer is like this. I’m like, “I just think it’s really swell being interviewed!” And he’s like “THERE IS NO SELF.”

by Scott Smith

#3 Sausage Rolls

What? These little gits made it to number three on your list? Well yes, mainly because we miss our mum’s sausage rolls. You remember, those party platters, piled high with mini sausage rolls that you would eat along with the cheese and pineapple on a stick treats… They were especially great when you would find yourself in a party with lackluster conversation – you could walk around with a nice paper plate of these buggers and start eating them when you needed some cover.

by Scott Smith

3. The one where I’m lying on my back so that it’s easier to suck in my stomach and I’m using my arms to push my boobs toward the ceiling so they look perky and he doesn’t grab any part of me that I think is fat. Which is all of me, really. Fuck. Now I’m depressed. Let’s go get ice cream.

by Scott Smith

That’s a curious sentiment from somebody who’s gone out of his way to make fun of religion.

I do believe that a belief in god is crazy, but that doesn’t mean that the people who believe in it are crazy. Those are two different things. Ideas can be stupid and crazy and the people who hold those ideas are not necessarily stupid and crazy.

by Scott Smith

Five Things I Learned About Tomatoes This Week

1. Never store tomatoes in the fridge. They lose flavor in lower temperatures. Apparently everyone but me knew this.

2. To peel a tomato: Cut out the core, carve a shallow X into the skin of the bottom, and throw the tomato into boiling water for fifteen seconds. Drop it in ice water to release the skin, and peel with a paring knife, starting where you cut the X.

3. Before you serve tomatoes in a salad, quarter them, put them in a colander, and sprinkle them with salt. Let them sit for ten minutes, then shake off the extra salt and liquid. The salt pulls out extra water and creates a more intense flavor.

4. Roasting tomatoes is easy. (Cut in half, lengthwise. Sprinkle with olive oil, salt, and thyme. Bake at 350 until the tomato is much smaller and caramelized on the edges — a little more than three hours.)

by Scott Smith

Until recently, I thought that there would never again be an opportunity to be involved with an industry as socially destructive and morally bankrupt as the subprime mortgage industry. I was wrong. The for-profit education industry has proven equal to the task.